Tales of the Shattered Moon: Cinders In Her Wake
by Darthkvzn
Summary: Because the most terrifying thing about evil, is the humanity within it.


**I don't exactly know why, but this came to mind. Perhaps I've been writing too many heroes lately? - Darthkvzn**

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She'd once gone by another name. One less...pretentious, shall we say?

She'd once been another person, too. Where one might call her such useless labels as evil, and a sociopath, she used to be considered sweet, and kind. It was all a fallacy, really. Humans, faunus...everyone living in this Dust forsaken planet. What did it matter, when the creatures of darkness, those known as Grimm would tear you apart, regardless of what you were known for? If nothing else, the beasts were fair. People never were.

Oh, once she'd longed for the acceptance they held above her head, dangling just out of reach. To be better, faster, stronger; all of these and more were required for the prize to lower, giving her a chance to grab it for herself.

Humanity was _idiotic_. It taught its young to be selfish in a world where cooperation was the only method of survival. At least the Faunus, for all of their non-existent society, knew this. Even if she thought little of them, they at least understood, through trials of fire and pain, that their only hope to survive on this Remnant of a world was to band together.

Of course, _sometimes_ , banding together just made extermination easier.

Mountain Glenn was supposed to be a beacon of hope. Peace had been somewhat attained after the war, and the creatures of Grimm had lessened their attacks on civilization. The project was intended to bring forth the idea that yes, humans and faunus could survive in this treacherous world. That differences could be overcome, and rifts could be healed.

She'd been born to those ideas. Her dad had been a freedom fighter, her mother a medic. Each loved the other, and she had been brought up to believe those feelings could exist. Not just in a romantic way, something to be experienced later on in her life, but also in a fraternal way. You could love everyone, if you only made the effort to understand them.

Her father died believing that. He was killed by people who didn't.

Darkness tainted her life a little, then; for how could such a good man die for believing in the good of others? Was it not fair that he survive and prove his belief right? Was it not right for her to ask for retribution, that the injustice did not remain so for long?

The taint spread, a little more each time. One by one, they fell. Nobody knew, and nobody suspected. Her father had taught her to fight. To destroy the darkness, both in man and beast. To be filled with a little was a small price to pay for avenging her teacher.

The man with the grey hair didn't know, either, but he did see. He somehow knew the darkness that was slowly taking hold, could witness it despite its invisibility. Yet society had taught her to smile and be pretty, so he mistook it for cold determination. The man invited her, to learn to channel that anger. And since her father had given her the tools, but not the skills to go along them, she accepted.

To the man's credit, the darkness receded, a little. The others, they'd come from similar situations. Families, broken up by the war; children, abandoned to their fate, one they'd conquered and made their own. No one attended Beacon without grief in their hearts, for hope could only truly be brought by those who'd lost it all and survived.

Then, like a god grown tiresome of the mortals skittering around it, Remnant swallowed them all, and her heart was utterly consumed. Man had invented graveyards, but the world had created the biggest one of them all. Hundreds of thousands, dead.

Three of those, her only family.

She left, seemingly out of sheer pain and grieving: left behind her future in the limelight, to visit her buried past. But she wasn't sad. Her grief was non-existent, having broken her long ago.

She was angry. Mad, even. And like a roaring inferno, consuming all in its path, she would leave only cinders, and ash, and charred bone in her wake.

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 **I honestly don't know if that's good or bad. I didn't spend as much time on it as I usually do with my work. It certainly _felt_ right, so that's a good thing, right? Anyway, hope you enjoyed! I love writing villains. - Darthkvzn**


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